Drop on Request (DOR)
A Drop on Request (DOR) is a BUD/S candidate's own request to leave training. The Navy requires it to be said out loud and then put in writing, and the process is explained to candidates during orientation and again before evolutions.
How the Request Works
The Navy's 2023 command investigation sets out the process: a drop on request must always be expressed verbally and followed up in writing. It sits in a family of exits candidates are taught during orientation and before evolutions, alongside the medical drop, the medical roll, the performance drop and the set back, and the same document notes that some candidates misunderstand the differences between them and their consequences.
What Happens After a Drop
Since 2020, a candidate who drops on request, or is pulled from a class, during Hell Week is seen by a psychologist and spends the next 24 hours in the Recovery Observation Center, observed by an instructor and a medical professional. Disenrolled candidates are then assigned to the command's Phoenix Division, which prepares them to reclassify into another rating; the Navy points out that former NSW candidates have gone on to serve as Flag Officers and Master Chief Petty Officers of the Navy.
How Many Choose It
A drop on request is the single largest source of attrition in BUD/S. Averaged across the classes since 14 November 1998, 29% of a class's starting strength drops on request in the three weeks before Hell Week, an average of 44 candidates, and another 15% of those who enter Hell Week drop during it. The investigation's wider point is that candidates are given ownership of their continued participation: unless they disqualify themselves or fail the set standards, most continue until they decide otherwise.
Decide why you are here before the first cold, sandy morning. The door is left open on purpose, so the decision has to hold on a good day, not just on your worst.
Related Terms
First Phase is the seven-week opening block of BUD/S, the phase that selects and prepares candidates physically and psychologically for the rest of the pipeline. It holds Hell Week, and it is where most of a BUD/S class is lost.
Hell Week is the fourth week of First Phase at BUD/S, the five-and-a-half-day stretch the Navy calls the course's crucible event. A class goes into it after three weeks of increasingly hard physical evolutions and comes out of it either still in the class or gone from the pipeline.
A rollback, which the Navy calls a set back, means a candidate repeats part of the BUD/S pipeline instead of leaving it. It exists so a candidate who is injured or behind the standard can rejoin a later class rather than lose their place in the pipeline entirely.
BUD/S (Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL) preparation refers to the structured physical training undertaken before entering the Navy SEAL selection pipeline. The Naval Special Warfare Physical Training Guide outlines a 26-week progressive program designed to build the endurance, strength, and mental resilience required to attempt BUD/S.
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